Ember's Echo (The Nimbus Collection Book 2)

by D. C. Clemens

  “Too bad they all blew up,” said an annoyed Briannika.

  “In any case,” Kiran said, still talking to Brent, “we have to keep you disconnected from our network, assuming whatever you have can spread wirelessly. Just keep in connection with Hardy, so he can monitor the frequency.”

  “Understood,” said Brent.

  After an interval of pensive silence, Briannika asked, “What now, captain? Hold out until the next rescue team arrives?”

  “We’ve little other choice. If providence is on our side, then the Wanderer was able to jump a distress signal wherever it ended up. Even if it couldn’t, the Coalition will be aware that we haven’t given our scheduled updates. With now irrevocable signs that something is clearly wrong with this area, I expect they’ll send a considerable response here within the next three days, at the latest.”

  “Sorry about that, doctor,” said Briannika. “It turns out the rescuers need the rescuing.”

  With this being our final contingency we could take, we begrudgingly acclimated ourselves with the idea of not only staying on this hostile world another couple of days, but knowing we could do nothing to better our chances at liberating ourselves from it. With Brent being helped into a sitting position at the corner of the wall, I was sent to the roof to aid the scout in its watch, seeing as the unlit centerpiece of the lighthouse prevented a complete 360 degree view of our surroundings. There were still a few hours of spawned darkness left before the time came to do to what was obligated of us to do to Fife’s body.

  As was to be expected in a galactic civilization comprising dozens of diverse species, there were necessary steps to respect when it came to how a society treated their dead. It was strangely harmonic how intelligent life respected the deceased, even that of other species. In fact, in the early days of the cross-species establishment of Parliament, the management of the deceased was one of the first galactic edicts passed with little trouble. There was a lot of political jargon involved, but the law basically stated that all intelligent species in Nimbus should give due deference to the dead of another species, whenever possible. Most viewed it as a sign of lower life forms to neglect the deceased, even those of an enemy. The situations varied, of course; there are plenty of ways to die, and there are even more customs and traditions to adhere to depending on the specific culture one was dealing with. Thanks to the basic digital memory always stored in the cybernetic part of our brains, it was a simple matter of matching the particular culture of the species with the circumstance we were in. It was because of this permanent memory that Emory would not have to personally go through the raw details of what Fife would require.

  According to the data I downloaded, the grimalkin had never buried their dead, seeing as they would not be resting peacefully if they did. This was due to the large and plentiful earthworm-like creatures known as di’keers. These atrocious things lived underground on their homeworld of Pavlon, an entire planet that bore a striking resemblance to the sweeping plains of Africa, if African grasslands had a touch of indigo tinge to them. A di’keer photo attached to the file showed a brown, python-sized maggot, except, unlike either maggot or snake, it protruded two scrawny forearms near its bulging head that ended with spade-shaped claws the beast used to support its excavating escapades. These unsightly animals were scavengers and ravenously ate everything in their path with their leech-like mouths, including bodies encased in anything less dense than solid stone coffins.

  In effect, the grimalkin had an extensive tradition of resting their dead in flame, complete with rituals, of course. By this Age, the grimalkin had a cemented custom of cremating their deceased in the open air and at the same time the star of whatever world they were on was rising—though if the world the individual died on was tidally locked with the star, or if it took an inconvenient amount of weeks for the night cycle to end, then those performing the ritual would coincide with Pavlon’s time. This practice was to aid the spirit of the deceased in its ascent to the Ether, the dimensional source of all vida, where it would be recycled and used by the Sacred to create more life. It was a near necessity for warrior grimalkin that warped fire be the flame kindling the corpse on an encasement of warped soil, followed by a warped wind blowing the last of the ashes from the dying pyre. This was our plan for Fife. I would provide the warped altar of stone and the captain would deliver the righteous flame and wind.

  Fortuitously, there were no disruptions during the slow night to interfere with our holy plans, even the gusting wind soothed its howls enough to add to the ruse of tranquility. Moments before Ember’s sun rose above the horizon, I was rising the gray stone ground outside the lighthouse, shaping it into a narrow bowl that would be a little longer than Fife and which would position his body a foot below the brim. The slightly elevated head of the dish faced the western sunrise. Emory next emerged from the still pitch-black tower carrying an unarmored Fife. His cousin’s entire body had been tightly wrapped with an airy, sturdy white cloth that had been crammed inside a small compartment found in every grimalkin armor. It was customized with religious symbols and personal touches that illustrated who the wearer wrapped within it was. Fife’s cloth depicted the universal, seven-armed, swirled emblems of the Sacred Spiral that were mingled around the pics of Fife’s family and friends. Among these digitally embroidered photos was a businesslike snapshot of our team standing on top of the roof of our headquarters. Another function of the sanctified cloth was to enhance the burning. Emory was soon followed by the rest of the group, each holding a piece of Fife’s armor—Brent’s condition exempted him from carrying anything—and Emory gently placed his kin in the stone basin.

  All of us encircled our once sprightly comrade. Even behind his visor, I could clearly see Emory’s large eyes glistening in the rousing light. Those holding a section of his armor placed their piece inside the basin at Fife’s feet. Most of the armor wouldn’t ignite, but the idea was to burn every hint of Fife’s fur, skin, and scent off of it. As we had no Sacred priest to invoke the chant, it was left to Vasilissa’s delicately rich voice to commence the ceremony with the proper grimalkin psalm. At the same time, the captain began the burning.

  In a voice that was commanding, soft, and reverent, she recited, “Fallen body, evaporated mind of lost warrior, lost to us by bloody heat of cold battle, we know that whilst your physical body is no more, the fires of spirit escort your soul to the everlasting, to be breathed in by all that is holy in our God’s Realm and to be breathed out to bestow life once again.”

  During her saintly delivery of the psalm, the captain was increasing the temperature of his vibrantly warped flame. With his four-clawed, right hand he emitted a stream of pure orange fire. From the other he added a dense flow of oxygen to create an inexhaustible and ever swelling amount of fuel for that sweltering inferno, turning the bearable auburn flame into a blinding white hot blaze at the basin and which wholly blocked out Fife’s body from view. I started to think that maybe the armor would melt after all. The focused flame was far brighter than the scarcely rising star and we must have been easily perceptible by non-aided sight for at least a mile. None of us were worried about enlightening our enemy of our location, however, as we were all convinced that we had been watched by something ever since leaving the demolished shuttle.

  With Vasilissa done with her part, it was Emory’s turn to conclude the battlefield version of a warrior’s final rights. In a lighthearted tone he was fighting to keep it so, Emory said the final benediction:

  “Heavy bones to swirling ash of Pavlon,

  Patchy fur to black mists of the Heavens,

  Juicy heart to hot waters of Gray Sea,

  Up you go Fife! And may you come back down!”

  At the same moment Emory began his last line, he raised his arms and eyes toward the sky and the captain stopped pouring his intense firestorm into the basin. But the blaze did not die down, for every few seconds Kiran reinforced it with a burst of compact oxygen. All there was for the next few minutes was the
muffled crackling of the fire as its cinders danced wildly above the tomb. Kiran soon ceased his occasional bolstering of the furnace, and as the fire lost its fuel and withered away, I saw why. Though expected, it was still a shock to see nothing but Fife’s charred armor at the bottom of the stone bowl. With a blast of warped air from the draken, Fife’s ash pile was blown up into the natural, whistling winds of Ember, seeing it disperse into the horizon until we could see it no more.

  For the last act, I began to lower the basin back into the stone ground, eventually burying the armor completely with stone and topsoil. The ceremony was over for a grimalkin lost in battle, but as a human I felt there needed to be a physical sign of the dead. I warped some of the stone basin back up and molded it into a small headstone. I then clairvoyantly etched the Sacred Spiral, and below that I inscribed the epitaph: Here burned Fife by Sacred flame… grimalkin, son, brother, uncle, cousin, comrade, and friend.

  Chapter Twelve

  The next few hours were spent in a revolving door of rest and restless lookout. We kept watch over the brightening horizon and orange lands, expecting to see the abominable puppets of our enigmatic enemy to appear at any moment. Our apprehensive anticipation for something to materialize from the dusty vista came to fruition near the uppermost crest of the midday star. Even before the scout’s mechanical vision picked up the first signs of danger from its post on the roof, giving us a little beeping alarm to our comm links, any stone or wind based arcanist could sense the change in the atmosphere. For my part, in my place in the first floor, it felt as if the ground in the distance was becoming inverted and that a mountain of it was heading in our direction. Through the scout’s dexterous eye, we could see an inflamed cloud of dust charging in from the north, easily swallowing the tallest structures a mile away.

  Making sure he was aware of what I felt, I used the party line to tell Kiran, who was on the second floor, “Captain, I don’t think that’s a regular sandstorm.”

  “I know,” he answered me, rather grimly. “I can feel it, too. It’s probably being warped.”

  “An entire sandstorm?” the talorian expressed in disbelief. “Wouldn’t it take a crap load of arcanists to create something like that?”

  The sudden fluctuating of Brent’s life signal interrupted further contemplation of the storm. Vasilissa and I rushed upstairs, outwardly hearing Briannika attempt multiple times to get the lieutenant to respond to her. There was never an answer. On reaching the second floor, where everyone was now gathered, Brent’s life signal had flatlined and we could see bright crimson blood trickling down his mouth.

  “Sacred, what happened to him?” I heard Dr. Oleson ask in a whisper, though her voice resonated loudly in the still room.

  As Vasilissa started her scan on the lifeless body, the preliminary howls of a fierce wind came through the window. After a few seconds, Vasilissa stood back up and said, “It appears his microtech turned on him. His brain’s cybertech fried itself, killing all brain activity.”

  “This confirms it, right?” said Emory in his new leaden voice. “Brent must have had an advanced type of invader file injected into him. There was definitely no external signal detected.”

  “Probably,” Kiran said, “but if the warped sandstorm is any indication, we’re about to be ambushed. Uriel, Emory, and I will see what we can make of this storm. The rest of you stay here and make sure we don’t get surprised from below. See if Lieutenant Henring can be covered in something.”

  By the time we procured the highest spot we could attain, the thickest section of the tidal wave of sand was only two hundred yards away and the initial surge of coercive dust had already enveloped the island, spoiling the sunbeams. The first significant detail we noticed was identifying that the auburn monster was not completely aligned with the natural wind, pretty much confirming its warped origin. To partially amend our exceedingly exposed forms, I warped all the incoming sand I could gather and created as compressed a wall as I could around the entire border of the circular railing, raising it about seven feet high. I likewise formed small holes every three feet near the top to allow us to shoot without having to bare our heads above the wall. Taking on the role of a compass, Kiran kept watch over the north, Emory the east, the scout the west, while I overlooked the south. The brunt of the sandstorm had arrived seconds after my wall was erected, cutting off the daylight by more than half.

  “Do you think they wish to kill us or infect their virus?” I asked.

  “They seem to do whatever seems most convenient,” answered the captain. “In this situation, I’d go with them trying to kill us. They’d fuckin’ better. I want to actually shoot something.”

  I felt the same way. Our desire for a straight fight didn’t take long to fulfill itself. Whizzing from the north were a few streams of expelled bullets, most of which impacted some part of the stone structure. My wall of condensed sand couldn’t outright stop most of the projectiles from ripping through, but if a slug did strike us, it was slowed enough for our shields not to suffer from their full burden, preventing them from quickly depleting. The smothered impact of a bullet to our shield also enabled our suit’s computers to more swiftly calculate the original address of the slug, automatically sending the data to our helmet’s HUD. So even with the low visibility and stifled sounds the dusty storm fostered, the captain began countering the onslaught with his own fairly accurate offensive a few seconds later. Emory eagerly joined him soon after. According to the gathered data, the attack was originating from the rows of homes some three hundred yards to the north.

  With Kiran and Emory providing what cover fire they could provide, I attuned my assault rifle to its sniper-mode. The barrel lengthened by several inches and became marginally wider, allowing for the internal laser to shear off the largest category of slugs from the ammo block. I also activated the option for my new sniper rifle to place the target-seeking nano-computers in each missile-shaped bullet. It prolonged the rate of fire, but the insanely high accuracy made the compromise well worth it in certain circumstances. These lethal conveniences made me more of a spectator than marksman, given that all I needed to do was roughly lock on to the sought after target, even if it was no bigger than a raindrop.

  I rested the gun’s barrel in one of the openings in the sand wall and meticulously scanned the field through the scope using a myriad of different sights outside the visible spectrum of light, ignoring the interweaving hissing of the bullets and their occasional impact on my shield. My entire existence was compressed into my rifle’s slim scope, no breath entering or leaving me. Of course, there was a real concern they would use heavy weaponry, but that would also more quickly reveal their positions. With the aid of thermal imaging, computer estimations, and the honed instincts that came from military training, I caught a blurry human form appear behind a corner of a two-story home. It was only someone taking a peek using the scope of their rifle, but it was enough. My thermal imaging confirmed a hit when a heated splatter of fluid and jelled matter erupted out the back of the head. Seconds later, without the support of the sniper function, the captain felled another. Nonetheless, the attack did not letup until two more were confirmed hit, but the barrage did not abate by much. Regardless, the slight slackening permitted Emory to join me in the more methodical version of the hunt, helping to dispatch another a moment later.

  In what was near the third minute of the violent session, I began seeing the skeletal shades that belonged to Ember’s imps spill out from behind the desiccated homes. There were only a handful at first, but that quickly changed. As if someone had smashed the top of an anthill, a virtual army of Ember’s demented citizens disgorged from the storm’s bowels and swiftly rambled toward our fortification. Methodical went out the window, all of our weapons switching to full auto. Having little other choice, the captain called up Briannika for support. Dozens were killed among the four of us, but the barely dented living sea was only getting closer to the liquid barrier. We couldn’t be sure if the imps could cross the exp
anse of the river, but we didn’t want to give them the chance. Relentlessly firing on the unarmed aggressors forced us to neglect the more modern weaponry striking our defenses, depleting our shields to a greater degree. Every time one of our shields was close to wholly giving out, we would spend a precious few seconds in the calmer southern end of the roof so the shield could regain its permanence.

  It was during one of these vitally slow shield replenishings that I felt something alarming move up my feet. Arising from somewhere within the island were a few unidentified vibrations. I succinctly informed everyone about the possible incursion and headed for the spot on the roof that would give me a better angle to see whatever had caused these meager ripples, which was on the east side. I asked Vasilissa to check from the window on her floor. I found nothing visible on reaching the desired spot, but another passing second produced the tiniest of pulsations that signified something was coming closer to the lighthouse. I was sure these fleeting tremors would have been missed if our impromptu fortification had not been densely and expertly warped. Knowing this was no time to take things as I saw them, I fired where I projected the source of the pulsations originated. The dozens of miniature fingers prolonged my reach and their vehement fondling struck what was seemingly the air itself, but what was instead a cloaked entity. Vasilissa joined in my barrage and the being’s cloak was shattered under the metal hail, completely exposing its covert presence.

  My not so serene eyes saw what looked to be a scrawny, pulsating machine standing about fifteen feet tall. The mechanism was of an impeccably white hue in almost every slice I saw of its central body. Lashing in frenzy at the ends of its two gaunt arms were dozens of tendrils. These were of a gloss of silver and were around half as thick as a human finger. The last feature I caught was its featureless face, which was at the end of a long silver neck. There was nothing; no eyes, sensors, depressions, or engravings of any kind on the triangular shaped head, which did not have any sharp corners or sides. It was simply an indifferent, whitened void staring at nothing in particular, and yet, there was a sense that I was the focus of its attention. A shudder I was unable to suppress.